OK, so this is a shameless stealing of the idea from ESPN's page 2, but what do you think? Sitting Mia for a game when she's on a roll? Sitting CP when she was the only one that was making an impact? Wasting a roster spot or two on players that were less than 100% physically? lack of creativity / not playing to the talents of the team? Not "sitting" the coach? - my favorite, and could include all the above! yours?
I will never understand how after the WUSA the U.S. was left to keep MacMillan(hurt) and Milbrett(out of form) on the Nat. team. If you think about it the next best forward was a high school senior/college freshman recovering from a broken leg. I still can't post about how bad U.S. womens' soccer is doing with out believeing the people in charge are either dumber than most of us, or they have another agenda.
Sitting Mia against South Korea was tremendously stupid. April shut down that engine. I loved that Mac cameback because I felt she had the skill and experiace to come in and play her "super sub" role when we were in a pinch. So when the moment came and went when we needed that spark and Mac wasn't played you have to ask "what was the point in putting her on the roster?" Not inviting Boxx in sooner. I still think April screwed the pooch against the Germans... her subs made no impact at all!
it is all about ape.... the invisible line remains 1. failing to make adjustments vs. germany when it was obvious our midfield was stuggling and hurried. 2. bivens for pearce vs. germany which caused less flank offense, lost us experience which is critical in a world cup, and led to the garafrekes goal. 3. failing to bring in wambach and boxx sooner. wambach to me was always a gimmie, and the need for some physical presence in the mid was also obvious. as far as wambach is concerned, heinrichs has let her personal feelings cloud her coaching judgement. Better late than never, but she has had this team for nearly 4 years, has watched wusa all summer, so how hard a decision could it have been? Is she that poor of a judge of talent or that indecisive? Poor leadership skills if you ask me. They needed to be brought into games to gel with the team sooner than the cup, and I am sorry, but cupcake friendlies do not count. 4. Catatonic and dysfunctional coaching vs. germany. Again, no leadership ability when it counts. Stupid pregame speeches do not make up for nailbiting comotose coaching in the heat of the battle when your players need you most. 5. Creating an atmosphere of unbalance among the players by not having established starters, and by not allowing her players to have the freedom to go outside her rigid anal coaching parameters. 6. April being a gutless coward by blaming the loss against germany on her defense. 7. Dr. Boob not canning april immediately after her little horror show of coaching vs. germany. that is a start......
Re: it is all about ape.... the invisible line remains I agree with you about not playing Pearce. I think she could have been very effective. I would also have liked to have seen Roberts in midfield. However, I would point out that is was Wambach who let Garefrekes run completely unmarked to the near post to meet the corner kick. Bivens was exactly where she was supposed to be, on the line guarding the post. It was Wambach's responsibility to mark Kerstin and she blew it, leaving Foudy to try and out-jump a six-footer from behind, not Bivens. It was my understanding that April wanted Abby to do something other than hang around waiting for someone to send a perfect cross she could get her head on - like play some defense (see above), learn to dribble so she can take people on when teams deny the cross (like Germany did), and to quit relying solely on her size (which when she came up against players who matched that - Germany - she had nothing to fall back on). Personally, I think if O'Reilly had not broken her leg she would have been on the team instead of Wambach and we would have been better off. Boxx played well in the early rounds, again against teams she could intimidate. Against Germany that didn't work because they matched her size and were much faster. Meinert, Wiegmann, Linfors and Wunderlich weren't about to be intimidated and Boxx and Foudy couldn't match them in the middle at all. When they counter-attacked, Germany left Foudy and Boxx in the dust. That's where Pearce and Roberts could have really helped. To the extent that Wambach made a play I wouldn't expect of a U14 in leaving a six-foot midfielder alone at the near post on a corner kick, I think she was more honest rather than gutless.
Rewind the tape. What play led to the corner kick on which germany scored? A rookie mistake by Bivens. Yeah, wambach f'd up on the coverage, but there was much more wrong with the way the game was coached than that single screw up. If O'Reilly were healthy, no doubt she would have been on the roster instead of Abby-but ask yourself, should millie or mac have then been ahead of wambach? April gives some players a bye when they under perform (Millie) and puts others on the roster who were not ready to play full out. (mac). Therefore, her decision making sucks. As for what April SAID to justify her head games with wambach, and what in reality were the reasons for her failure to make Wambach a part of the cup team until the very last minute, I chose the latter. Just my opinion. Again, we had 3 v 4-5 germans at the mid. Can you deny that this contributed to the difficulty all our mids were having? Why wasn't an adjustment made when it was clear this formation was not working? As for Boxx, again, including her before the last minute would have benefited her play and blooded her in a fashion which better prepared her for a game like the one against the Germans. ah, but her reference was to "the defense," not offense failing to defend on corners. April complained about “the defense,” saying they needed to self-evaluate and bemoaned the loss of Chastain as a critical problem for them. She had nothing but unabashed praise for the defense prior to the game v. germany. April never ever blames herself. I am editing this to include her exact comments: "After the Americans won the third-place game against Canada, Heinrichs acknowledged areas that needed improvement. "I've watched the Germany game three times on tape now," she said. "It's difficult to possess the ball against a team as tactically brilliant as Germany.... We gave away too many balls for no reason. All of our players in the back, particularly, need to continue to self-evaluate." (but there WAS a reason april, you just were too anal to do anything about it.....) "Heinrichs also said the loss of veteran Brandi Chastain because of a broken bone in her foot was a big blow. Chastain, in a spectator's role most of the World Cup, said the players are well aware of flaws." You may not be able to access this link without membership, but this is an October 19 article by MECHELLE VOEPEL in the kansas city star. http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansa...i@yahoo.com&KRD_RM=8oosoorxwwxxuptpvwqooooooo|paul|N&is_rd=Y
You are blaming the wrong people. Don't blame Dr. Bob for not firing April. He wants to keep his job and had to leave this one alone. Look at what happened to Hank Steinbrecher when he did not follow Ms. Foudy's orders. Don't blame April either. She takes orders from Ms. Foudy. Why else would we not see Boxx until the WWC? I can't remember a single example of a player getting their first cap at a World Cup. But Boxx plays the same position as Ms. Foudy and never got a chance until it became apparant they had to do something to shore up the slow midfield. Mia was benched in the Korea game to keep her from taking the spotlight away from Ms. Foudy, who came on as a second half substitute. When did you ever hear of a defensive midfielder being subbed into a situation like that? Bad for the team but another TV appearance forr Ms. Foudy. We didn't have our best players on the WWC team. The small clique that Eric Wynalda wrote about made sure The Supernaturals got more publicity...while we got out head handed to us. Just my opinions.
It was actually Fawcett who gave up the corner, but I guess I see it like corner kicks happen all the time and whenever they do it can normally be considered a mistake on somebody's part. Nobody likes giving up a corner but everyone knows they happen and you have to defend them so I don't buy the part about blaming a player who caused the corner for a goal being scored. The US earned 10 corner kicks to Germany's five. We had two corner kicks in the first 2 minutes, the first caused by a German heading the ball out over the end line with no American in ten yards of her. Their keeper caused one herself. They didn't worry about who caused them, they just defended them and sure didn't let Wambach or Parlow wander around in the box completely unmarked. Sweden gave up 23 corner kicks in the final without surrendering a goal on any of them. I don't disagree at all about mac and millie. In MacMillan's case, however, I think the decision was complicated by the fact the she was the leading scorer on the team each of the last two years, and player of the year in 2002. I think that is the main reason April gave her every opportunity to rehab her knee. Millie's problems were obviously different. Still, when she was inserted into the match against Germany, she was immediately effective and nearly drew a pk which would have equalized. Had O'Reilly made the squad, it would have created a totally different situation regarding Abby, Millie and Mac, and I cannot say Wambach should have in that case been left off. If they are all healthy and the forwards are Parlow, Hamm, O'Reilly, MacMillan and Milbrett I do believe Wambach is the one with the least playing time because her game is totally one-dimentional. I also believe that if Fotopoulos and Christy Welsh are healthy Abby is in fact not on the team because the both have her size plus better skills. We did start off playing a 4-3-3 compared to Germany's 4-4-2 but I think it is not accurate to say we were going against 4-5 German mids. Garefrekas was constantly going forward on her flank. Anytime they were on the attack, she was running with Prinz and Meinnert, never holding back. On the other side, outside back Stegemann was constantly going forward while Wunderlich held from her midfeild position. So while the formations indicated numbers for Germany in midfield, the way the match was played didn't really bear that out. The US attacked on the flanks and played crosses in. Parlow was very effective in the first half getting clear to serve balls in. When that happened, though, Germany left the flank defender on her own and defended the cross. When Germany attacked, they went straight up the middle with either Meinnert or Lingor on the ball and players on either side. In contrast, the US never attacked up the middle from a midfield position so what we had a lot was balls served from the flank to two forwards who were surrounded by the four backs with Lingor and Wiegmann dropping back. In her defense, I think April did try to make an adjustment when she inserted Wagner for Parlow at the 52nd minute. The only reason for doing that would have been to change the point of attack and test the center but Wagner wasn't up to the task either. I would have liked to have seen Parlow actually turning the corner and going toward goal with the intent of creating her own shot, but I think we have gotten to used to playing people a foot shorter than we are. Germany's back line is 5'7", 5'8", 5'8" and 5'10" so the easy stuff we were used to wasn't going to happen. Beyond all that, looking at the stats, the US had the run of play. We had more possession, more shots, more shots on goal, and more corner kicks. Germany got an early goal off a USA mental error and was good enough to make it stand up, without ever going to a bunker. They got their last two goals after the 92 minute, on beautiful counterattacks by two of the best forwards in the world when the entire US team was pushed up trying to score. Rottenburg had the match of her life, controlling her area and making several superb saves, including a one v. one against Hamm and the save against Milbrett. So, Germany has got to get SOME credit for winning the match. It was not, after all, like we lost to Jamaica. One last thing I think. US Soccer is going to have to find a way to get some decent competition for the team. We are in the weakest confederation in FIFA. The last few years we have been spending our time beating up on Jamaica, Panama and Costa Rico, and making fun of the WUSA, while the rest of the world has been developing some serious programs. Europe in particular is getting completely behind its teams. Their club programs are rapidly expanding and are fully embraced by UEFA. All the Europeans playing in the World Cup went straight from here to their club seasons, to UEFA Cup competition and to qualifying matches for the 2005 Euro Cup national team championship. While our players are sitting home twiddling their thumbs, the rest of the world is playing. Prior to '99 we played many matches against the top rank of national teams. The last two years we played no friendlies against the other best teams. With all the changes happening every place else, it is only going to be harder to find teams to play. Why should Germany come over here when they have all the competition they need at home? As it stands, we do not have people ready to step in and replace Hamm and Lilly when they retire. We are still struggling to replace Carla Overbeck three years later and despite the jokes about Foudy we don't have any one ready to step in and do what she did for the team prior to this year. In two years, we might not be the best team in CONCACAF much less the world. Without a first division type league, we do not have a development program that will be able to compete, regardless of who the coach is. A couple of training camps and friendlies against bad teams will not keep a team able to compete against people who are playing practically year 'round no matter how talented they are.
there is a connection Look, if you want to ignore the fact that Bivens blew her coverage and failed to get back leaving Fawcett with no option, go ahead. So did April know all along that Millie would come to play in Portland, even though she'd played herself off the team by cup time? I guess she was saving her for that one game... Wow....Since I don't wish to antagonzie the Fotop and Welsh fans, all I will say is I could not disagree more. Just do not see it, and sorry, but Wambach is as "dimensional" as either of the two, and I will leave it at that. Germany had 5 mids the first half. Germany’s tactics worked because we made no adjustments. I think the German coach must have been pinching herself when Heinrichs made no change in formation. As for movement by the German midfield, I don't get your point. Middies should move depending on the situation. That doesn't erase the fact that there were more of them than us. Well, why wouldn’t Germany go straight up the middle? That is their strength. Did we come into the game with a plan to break that strength? No we played right into it by losing bodies at mid. For the same reason, the US could not attack up the middle. Attacking on the flanks was predictable. April is too predictable, and again, Germany had us pegged. Parlow played well and had some gas left.. I would have left her in a while. As for inserting Wagner, well at that point, April was desperate and trying to shake things up. Inserting wagner, however, was not the way to do it, given the fact that she's faded all year and is not the spark-plug type.... In addition, no one is comparing Germany to Jamaica. Germany is the only team that could have stopped us- I could accept it if April made better decisions. But she simply became stubborn, then wilted. You seem like you blame Wambach for the loss, and I am not sure why you would peg her over a woman who makes the decisions and has evaluated the talent for the last 4 years. April is probably a good person, April was a great player, but she is a lousy coach who lacks vision. Sad to see Dr. Boob saddle the nats with her for the olys. I absolutely agree with your point about the lack of decent friendlies. Certainly at the very least we could play Canada and Brazil instead of wasting our time on the likes of Costa Rica.
If I was allowed to have only two choices it would be: Having the coach that we did Keeping same coach It all boils-down to the coach.
Worst USWNT/WWC move: April's visor. What was she thinking!? Also; agree the WNT needs better competiton in friendlies. Although the "B" team did well against North Korea, Mia should have played. Why didn't MacMillan get to play more in the WWC? I know many people think a roster spot was wasted because Mac wasn't 100% but I thought the few times she was on the field she played well. I think it's more that her chance to make an impact in the WWC was wasted because she mostly sat on the bench. While it may have been something that couldn't wait, announcing the demise of the WUSA right before the WWC was awful timing. It put a dark cloud over WWC '03. Ummm, the red shirts--bad move--bad luck. I'm convinced the WNT sucks when wearing them.
Good point tom t. ...sadly... and yeah, both the visors and the red jerseys must go, though I believe you will see new jerseys for the olys to break the curse........
from what I know about Mac and the knee is that at practice she was just getting to were it was ok to have contact and they wanted to play Mackie the least that they could. Most speeds were still too much for her and the hard, fast having to change speeds and directions alot were still not good for her or the knee. Also Mentally nobody was certain how she had healed. DW I think this is the first time in my life I have ever agreed with you. scary. sorta.
In the natural order of progression I can not see where the U_21 Nat Team fits in to the devolpement of the WNT. Where are they? Is there a U-21 Nat Team and if the ODP system really worked wouldnt this be the place the next WNT would come from?
My favorite move was including Brandi Chastain on the squad for the Mexico friendly even though she had a broken foot and could not play. The team practiced one day for the debacle (they were too busy you know). That should remove any doubt that the USWNT is being run for The Supernaturals and not the national interest. Just my opinions.
“Part of the World Cup contract with the USSF was to play in these post-tournament matches. Hence, this game and the upcoming one with Mexico should not be thought of as chances Heinrichs had to try out non-WC-roster players. Any experimentation will have to be with players already on the roster – with two exceptions. Mia Hamm was excused - at least for this match - to recover from small WC nicks – and Cat Reddick needed to return to her classes to catch up. Heinrichs called in Lori Chalupny and Lindsay Tarpley to replace them. ….. Some players didn’t get into the match. Cindy Parlow is still suffering from her concussion, Briana Scurry was ill, Brandi Chastain and Angela Hucles were still judged not fully recovered enough to play.” http://www.cybersoccernews.com/uswomen/031023us-italy.shtml Your point is ridiculous. Brandi was there for fan good will and contractual purposes. Ask anyone who was there which player stayed to sign autographs. The answer is Brandi. There was absolutely no motivation for the players to insist that Chastain be present. Finally, if the veterans had the pull you suggest, Tony Dicicco would still be coaching them. They would have forced the USSF to give him the contract offer he deserved. Until you have something analytical to say beyond the silly prattle about foudy and the veterans being responsible for April's crappy coaching, I have nothing more to say to you.
U.S. U-21 Women Sounds to me that they are using the U-21 team to prep gals for the big show. The U-21 team is a perennial winner at the Nordic Cup, the unofficial women's U-21 championship.
Good question. The U-21 still exists and won their fifth straight Nordic Cup - their "world championship" - again in 2003 behind Reddick, Nandi Price and Joanna Lohman. After several years under Jerry Smith, they are now coached by Chris Petrucelli of Texas and formerly Notre Dame. I think a couple of things happened that took them of the sports pages for a while. First, a lot of former stars like Aly Wagner, Jena Kluegel, Hope Solo and Devvyn Hawkins aged off the team and their replacements weren't as well known. Second, the establishment the U-19 World Championship in 2002 put the focus on that team and the World Cup overshadowed them this year. Players like Tarpley, Chalupny, Fletcher, and Kelly Wilson have actually done double duty with both U19 and U21. Now that they have aged off the U19s, they should bring a lot of focus back to the U21 team. With FIFA seemingly putting its stamp on the U19 program, however, I wonder what that will mean for the U21 teams. This whole national team development thing is going to take some interesting turns in the next few years, I believe. As good as our young players are, I don't think they will be able to compete internationally in an atmosphere where other countries have strong club teams. Without a league or leagues here, how will people like Tarpley, Ramsey, Price, Kluegel, O'Reilly or any of the young players continue to develop in a manner to compete with their international peers who are in serious competition all year long? Europe in particular, with the backing and support of their national federations and UEFA for the clubs, could be far ahead of the US in 2007 if we are relying on ODP style pools and camps to prepare our teams. Without a professional league, US Soccer may at the least have to look at raising its involvement with the W-League or something to keep players active and in competition away from WNT duty. Or, spend a lot of money on year-round training.
I have no doubt that what you say is true, that there was a contract behind the selection of the injured Ms. Chastain. Pretty dumb contract, don't you think? Sure, people asked for her autograph after the hype she has gotten. But she can't play anymore and should not have been on the WWC team. Bobby Hull sigsn a lot of autographs but he isn't trying to play right wing at his age. If The Supernaturals wanted Diciccio as coach he would be the coach. Some of them wanted him out. You normally don't fire the coach who just won the Olympics and the WWC. But he insisted on having authority and has an added disadvantage in being a male. Ms. Foudy thought Diciccio was yelling too much at practice and working the team too hard. Another bad move was freezing Sam's Army out of the WWC. We were not allowed to buy tickets to the North Korea game, only being offered strips which included 3 other WWC games no one had any interest in seeing. For the other two preliminary round games tickets were offered only after they had been offered to everyone else in the world and die hards had already bought tickets. Same trick they pulled in 1999. At that game North Korea had a cheering section right at midfield. Sam's Army got kicked out of 2 places and ended up under the press box. North Korean fans got better treatment than Sam's Army, even though we were supporting the USWNT! Eight days before the WWC, Ms. Foudy and company sent out an email declaring, among other things, a new supporters' group: "Pony Tail Posse." Kind of an odd time to start a supporters group. Just my opinions.
Re: there is a connection What it looked like to me was that Bivens slipped when she started to track back. I am not a big Kylie fan so I don't tend to overlook her faults, trust me. I just disagree with you on blaming her for the goal. Corner kicks happen, and sometimes you have to give one up intentionally, but when they happen you have to defend them regardless of what caused it. Rottenburg and Gottschlich gave the USA two completely unnecessary corners, the first one minute into the match, and ten overall but they defended them. The US gave up four other corner kicks and defended the rest of them very well. Well, this is what makes being a soccer fan fun. My main thing with Abby is that she is nowhere near a lock for a foward spot on the teamin the future. We know she will have competition from O'Reilly, MacMillan, Parlow, plus U21s like Wilson, Tarpley and Chalupny but whether they beat her out for a spot or not Welsh and Fotop can compete for the "big" forward spot. Welsh is at least as fast as Abby if not faster, has a better long range shot and is more mobile. 2002 was the best I have ever seen Fotop play, even in college. I was saying all spring that, regardless of whether she made the World Cup roster or not, it would be in Abby's best interest to stop worrying about playing time and concentrate on how she can improve. I guess my point was that while Germany had a lineup that was listed as a 4-4-2 but in reality, Garefrekes played more as a third forward than as a mid. She was always a part of the attack and never fell back into a defensive position, even when a back came forward. In contrast, when a back moved forward, Wunderlich on the other side always took a holding position. So in reality, Germany's play was more like a 4-3-3 same as the USA. I think the difference was that Wiegmann and Lingor at center mid and Hingst and Minnert at center back did a better job at controlling the middle of the pitch than Foudy, Boxx, Fawcett and Sobrero did for the US. I don't blame Abby for the loss. I blame her for the goal as opposed to yourself who blames Kylie. Beyond that I just feel she has deficiencies, which she doesn't seem to see a need to address, in her game that cause the team problems when they start to rely on her. If a team makes her play to her weaknesses, she gets lost. She doesn't have to have the ball control that Hamm and Parlow have, but she needs to be able to take people on one v. one a little bit. Thank you.
The reality is that the worst women's soccer decision of 2003 was FIFA's decision to keep the tournament in September and October once it decided to move the tournament out of China. This forced the WWC to compete with the most exciting baseball postseason in years, college football and the NFL. The scheduling could not have been worse. Moreover, the decision to play the games in places other than the most marquee of soccer stadiums sent a message to the sports world at large that this tournament, unlike the '99 WWC, was being run as a second-rate event. That scheduling decision squandered too much of what the '99 WWC built. The second worst decision was not seeding Germany two behind the USA. It was obvious to anyone following the sport that Germany was better than China and that a USA - Germany final offered the best hope for a first-rate final. Another difficult decision for the USA was being forced to play games all over the country to serve as crowd generators while the team strove to get attention during this crowded time on the sports calendar. But, the USA benefitted from favorable travel schedules in '99, so one cannot objectively complain about that excessively. That being said, the USA lost to Germany because soccer is a game where sometimes one team gets everything to work right for an early goal (a perfectly driven kick, a just-right flick and it happens to hit the cross bar, leaving Scurry no chance) and makes it stand up. That is what happened in the semis. I realize the Heinrichs haters want to blame it all on the coach, but let's keep the following in mind. Heinrichs didn't give up any corner kicks. She didn't blow any coverages. She didn't fail to get off a shot on Wambach's beautiful through pass. She didn't miss headers wide. She didn't loft crosses instead of driving them. She didn't fail to run to an open area to leave Parlow a drop-back change-of-direction opportunity on the many runs that Parlow made down the right side. She didn't lose challenged ball after challenged ball. The players lost that game. Go back and watch the Germany game from '99. Then, too, the midfield for Germany was technically more proficient than that of the USA (other than Akers, who has retired). Indeed, the USA exerted far less pressure (even when trailing twice) and exhibited far less ball control skill in the '99 game than in '03. Their attack was slower and more disjointed in '99. I know that's heresy to Heinricsh haters, but that truth is inescapable when one watches the film. The USA was able to win in '99 because of a horrible header clearance goof that landed on Chastain's foot and because the Germans didn't cover a player no taller than 5'6", who headed in the decisive goal. The two teams were relatively evenly matched, and the USA barely prevailed, courtesy of gifts. This time, the result went the other way between two relatively evenly matched teams (remember, Germany needed extra time to beat a Swedish team in the finals that the USA defeated handily in the opener). Finally, those who think Wambach's inclusion on the team was a blunder must be inhaling illegal substances. She was the greatest thing that happened to USA women's soccer this year. She is the most exciting player since Akers. And, she is hardly one-dimensional. Look at the first goal against Sweden. Look at the finishes against Nigeria and North Korea. Look at the through ball to Hamm against Germany. Look at the chest and head control that she exhibits that nobody else matches. Look at the zest and verve she brings to the game. Look at her total game sense. When my Man U fanantic friend (man in his mid-30's) watched the Norway game, seeing Wambach play made him mutter, "Van Nistelrooy." I'm sorry, but there is nobody else on the USA team capable of generating that kind of response. Put simply, grown men who are sports fans enjoy watching Wambach play and aren't afraid to express awe and admiration for what she does on the field. The USA needs more players like her. Abby Wambach made an otherwise disappointing tournament memorable.